George Weigel is a prominent member and writer for the “Institute of Religious and Public Life”,an organization that runs “First Things”. Just what is their ideology? They tell us:

The Institute’s mission is to articulate a governing consensus that supports:

a religiously pluralistic society that defends human dignity from conception to natural death.

a democratic, constitutionally ordered form of government supported by a religiously and morally serious culture.

a vision of freedom that encourages a culture of personal and communal responsibility.

loyalty to the Western tradition that provide a basis for responsible global citizenship.

It is a mission statement that George Weigel approves of as a Member of the Board. Before we continue, let us recall and keep in mind that Weigel has declared himself an opponent of Fr. Antonio Spadaro S.J. But, is Weigel being consistent? Is there really opposition between the two men? Or, is it only a matter of tactics? A superficial opposition?

Let us explore this, by contrasting the Institute’s mission statement with the following:

“It is important to recognize that we are all citizens, and not divide citizens into believers or nonbelievers, Catholics or Protestants. What is truly important in political life is to recognize that we are all citizens of this country”.

“The church asks politicians to commit themselves in the world to build a better world through dialogue while bringing its own values to this project while respecting the fundamental separation of church and state”.

No difference, is there? Now, who wrote the second passage?

Perchance George Weigel?

No! It was none other than Fr. Antonio Spadaro S.J., in an interview he granted to the Jesuit neo-Modernist magazine, America.

Yet, George Weigel would have us believe he is a “conservative” and in the right, and Spadaro a “liberal”, in the wrong. A grave error to think so. No, Weigel is a liberal Catholic just as is Antonio Spadaro.

George Weigel and Antonio Spadaroa priori condemned by Pope Pius XI

You will notice that both men are SILENT about Jesus Christ and the social and political life of the Nation. Both are social modernists, strongly condemned by, for example, Pius XI. “First Things” and “America” is really an in-house quarrel between proponents of liberalism. It is very interesting and extremely interesting that both statements manifest a vision that is incredibly similar to that of Freemasonry.

Catholics, who may yet doubt my thesis (after all, Weigel has spent a good part of three decades rubbing shoulders with powerful churchmen), should acquaint themselves with at least one of Wiegel’s ponderous and verbose articles. An example of his mature intellectual thought can be read here.

Now to an experiment.

Read Pius XI’s, Ubi Arcano and Quas Primas.

Give it a few days, absorb the teaching of the holy Pope. Then return and re-read Weigel. The contrast between the Pope and Weigel is horrifying. Weigel has completely rejected the social Kingship of Christ.

There, in Weigel’s 1994 treatise, you see the insidious horror of liberalism, of Americanism. As a quaint aside, you will notice too, how the poor, deluded man’s predictions did not come to pass. Weigel even wrote these words about the charlatan and pervert, Bill Clinton: “Then there is the fact that we have a President who, unlike his predecessor, is unabashedly public about his Christian faith, and who seems to understand that the engagement of differing religious convictions within the bond of democratic civility is good for America”.

How could he write such buffoonery? How can any Catholic, or for that matter, any serious Christian or man or woman of good faith who is seeking Christ listen to this man? Yet he dares to excoriate Fr. Spadaro! A fellow liberal!

To re-emphasize: what Weigel and Spadaro advocate – a society that is: “a religiously pluralistic society…a democratic…government…for responsible global citizenship” [the Institute], and that “we are all citizens…to build a better world through dialogue…respecting the…fundamental separation of church and state” [Spadaro] – is it a position that can be held by a Catholic?

We shall seek the answer from Pius XI and see if Wiegel (Americanism) and Spadaro (Sillonism) think as the Pope did (Catholicism).

Pius wrote:

With God and Jesus Christ, excluded from political life, with authority derived not from God but from man, the very basis of that authority has been taken away, because the chief reason of the distinction between ruler and subject has been eliminated. The result is that human society is tottering to its fall, because it has no longer a secure and solid foundation.” Ubi Arcano

“If, therefore, the rulers of nations wish to preserve their authority, to promote and increase the prosperity of their countries, they will not neglect the public duty of reverence and obedience to the rule of Christ“.Quas Primas

“When once men recognize, both in private and in public life, that Christ is King, society will at last receive the great blessings of real liberty, well-ordered discipline, peace and harmony”. Quas Primas

“The right which the Church has from Christ himself, to teach mankind, to make laws, to govern peoples in all that pertains to their eternal salvation, that right was denied. Then gradually the religion of Christ came to be likened to false religions and to be placed ignominiously on the same level with them”.Quas PrimasWhom do you follow? Americanists, Sillonists, or the Catholic Church?